Love and Concrete
by LolaLoo
Summary: One shot. A response to Goldpiece's challenge. B&B disagree about what love is and wish they could admit the truth to one another.


**DISCLAIMER: Funnily enough, I don't own Bones. If I did, there'd be a lot more topless shots of David and TJ...**

**A/N: This fanfic is a response to Goldpiece's challenge to write a Bones one shot which had to include these three lines:**

**"You know I'd die for you, only sometimes it's so hard living with you."  
****"Come back in an hour. I'll be crazy by then."  
****"I couldn't help overhearing. I had my ear pressed to the door."**

**I'm sorry if it seems a little angst ridden at times but I'm just in one of those moods (probably because I now haven't slept in 38hrs…). Let me know what you think. **

Lola

* * *

Doctor Temperance Brennan didn't even know anyone else was in her office until a thick FBI file landed on her desk, making her jump about a foot out of her chair.

With a sly smile, Special Agent Seeley Booth slid in to the seat on the other side of her desk and eyed the x-ray in his partner's hand.

"Anything interesting, Bones?"

She laid the image down with a sigh.

"Do you really want to know what I'm working on?"

He flashed her his broadest smile and Brennan had to force herself not to immediately smile back.

"Not really. We've got a case."

"I can see that. What is it?"

She flicked open the file as Booth leant back, arms behind his head, and recited the facts.

"A load of building work's going on at the moment. They're redoing all those awful government buildings to make them slightly more pleasing on the eye than those Seventies monstrosities, I guess. They demolished a huge section yesterday only to find that there were two occupants inside."

Brennan's head shot up, her eyebrow's raised as she stared at Booth in disbelief.

"They didn't check the structure for people before they knocked it down?"

He shook his head.

"No, Bones, I mean these occupants were literally _inside_ the building. The bodies had been dumped in the concrete foundations. They've been there since the building went up thirty four years ago."

He seemed to shudder as he thought about it.

"God, we've been walking all over them for decades…"

Brennan scanned the photos of the partially uncovered skeletons with her usual level of detachment. She glanced up at her partner to find him staring at her intently.

"What?"

He grinned, his easy charm working on her yet again.

"You just look so cute when you're studying human remains. You get this look on your face…"

His handsome features contorted in to an over-the-top imitation of someone concentrating. Brennan rolled her eyes and returned to the file.

"I'll need the remains still within the concrete."

"I figured that. They're on their way over right now."

"Any idea who they might have been?"

Booth's grin was replaced by his serious demeanour as he produced another file.

"Well, seeing as this is government property that they were found in, I have my suspicions."

He pushed the file across the desk and Brennan opened it, two serious looking faces staring back up to her next to their FBI details. She glanced at Booth.

"They were FBI agents?"

He nodded.

"Both out of the DC office in the Seventies. It was rumoured that they were having an affair and about to tell their spouses when they disappeared. At first, it was assumed that they'd run off together but a little more digging revealed it was more likely they'd been killed."

"Is that your gut instinct?"

Booth flashed her another smile.

"Why, are you starting to trust it?"

Charm seemed to ooze out of his every pore. Brennan offered a small shrug.

"You do seem to have an aptitude for reading people, I admit that. I'm assuming that you have some other evidence for them being murdered."

"What, you mean besides the fact that they ended up covered in concrete?"

Bones glared at him. Smiling, he pulled out his notepad and went over his notes.

"Turns out that the male, Agent Jason Turnow, was working undercover with the Mob for a while. He was pulled out when it looked like his cover was about to be blown, which is when he would have met Agent Joanna Keyes. Before they disappeared, an internal investigation was already underway into the two of them over the possibility of embezzlement and money laundering. It looked like Turnow got a little too into the mob life while he was undercover."

Brennan's eyes locked on to Booth's.

"Do all your undercover agents end up turning into criminals themselves?"

He knew exactly who she was talking about and he swallowed hard, remembering how she had been kidnapped and almost killed by another agent. Booth cleared his throat, trying not to remember how close he'd almost come to losing her.

"Anyway, the cash was never recovered though it seems that it did go through an offshore account belonging to Keyes at one point. That makes a Mob hitman a pretty obvious suspect. Going over the file though, I've got to say I like her husband for this."

He rose from the chair and stretched, a ghost of a smile playing across his lips.

"Now that _was_ a gut feeling. I mean, it turns out the guy already knew about the affair, the money's still missing from Keyes account to which he likely had access and he got one hell of an insurance payout. Plus, there were two domestic disturbance calls from their neighbours in the fortnight before she disappeared."

Brennan nodded, watching him over the top of the file as he wandered around her office.

"Well, as soon as I have the skeletal remains, I'll be able to tell you if it really is these agents."

She paused, eyeing her partner as she put down the file.

"Have you ever had a relationship with someone you've worked with?"

He stopped dead in his tracks and turned to face her, an eyebrow raised in surprise as he folded his arms.

"Have you?"

Brennan felt herself bristle at the fact he had turned her own question against her.

"I just find it somewhat surprising that these two people were able to conduct this affair in the workplace, all the lies and deceit they had to perform. For what?"

Booth gave her an amused look.

"It's called love, Bones."

She shrugged and leant back in her chair as Booth perched on the edge of her desk.

"I understand the anthropological need for relationships in order to facilitate procreation and the continuation of the species, but I see no scientific evidence of love."

He threw his hands up in exasperation.

"Way to go sucking the romance out of it all. Love isn't something you can stick under one of your fancy microscopes, Bones. It's all about the heart, not the head."

Brennan felt herself getting defensive though she didn't know why.

"Love is just the attraction between compatible genetic structures and the fact that when two people spend a lot of time together, their chemical responses become synchronised. That's why people miss each other when they're apart, they become out of sync."

Both of them had felt their voices beginning to get louder.

"Bones, love isn't just about genetics and chemical reactions! It's about being there for one another, about sharing your experiences and wanting to do everything you possibly can to make them happy. It's about sharing your heart, your emotions, your hopes and fears, with the one person in the world you think you can spend the rest of your life with."

"That's not necessarily love, Booth. Look at us! We spend a lot of time together, share our experiences and I'd like to think that we're there for one another when we need it. But that's just because we're partners and friends."

Brennan didn't catch the almost pained expression that flashed across his face.

"Are you seriously trying to tell me that friendship doesn't include love?"

"No, that's a different type of love. We were talking about romantic attachments."

Booth looked like he literally wanted to shake some sense into her.

"It's all the same thing, Bones! One day you'll understand exactly what I'm talking about."

She practically jumped to her feet, staring him straight in the eye.

"And what's that supposed to mean?"

Booth opened his mouth to reply but quickly snapped it shut, biting back whatever cutting response he'd been tempted to say. He sighed heavily.

"I just meant… Nothing. Just forget it."

She was still glaring at him and he was beginning to feel uncomfortable.

_What were you going to say to her, you idiot? Take a look right in front of you and you'll know what love is? Tell her that it's standing right here?_

At his lack of response, Brennan moved back to her desk but still stood staring at him, hands on hips.

"I just don't agree that 'love' is everything that you claim it is."

Booth's cell phone began to ring and he snapped it off his belt, glancing at the caller ID before returning his gaze to her, a look of pure exasperation in his eyes.

"You know I'd die for you, only sometimes it's just so hard living with you."

He marched over to the door, opening it to reveal Angela stood right behind it. Rolling his eyes, Booth slid past her to take the call and she wandered inside, plonking herself down on the sofa.

Brennan returned her attention to the desk, shuffling files in an attempt not to look flustered. Sometimes Booth got her so riled up. She frowned, trying to ignore the way he made her feel.

_And how does he make you feel, Temperance? Are you honestly trying to convince yourself that the way he looks at you, the way he says your name, doesn't fill you with love, the very thing you try to pretend isn't real?_

Angela watched her silently for a few more minutes before finally getting to her feet and placing herself right in front of her friend's desk.

"Are you alright, sweetie? I couldn't help overhearing. I had my ear pressed to the door."

She grinned and Brennan couldn't help but laugh a little as she sat back down.

"Booth just drives me crazy sometimes."

It was Angela's turn to laugh.

"Sounds like you do the same to him."

Brennan stared down at her desk, the small toy pig catching her eye. She had told Booth how she'd always wanted to have a pet pig called Jasper when she was younger and he brought her this. She picked it up, liking the cool feeling of the ceramic. The significance of it didn't pass Angela by, who shook her head in disbelief.

"You two obviously have a thing for each other and you already fight like a married couple, so why aren't you together?"

Brennan rolled her eyes.

"Are you serious? It's Booth you're talking about!"

"Yeah, the same guy I'm always telling you to get with. You two are perfect for each other."

"Look Angela, do you actually need something?"

The artist smiled and shook her head slightly as she moved towards the door, pausing on the threshold.

"I just swung by to see if you wanted to get some lunch. But now I'm definitely taking you out so I can drill some sense in to you about that equally bone-headed but incredibly handsome partner of yours."

Brennan knew there was no point arguing with her. Slumping back in her chair, she offered a tired smile.

"Come back in an hour. I'll be crazy by then."

Angela grinned and disappeared, leaving Bones to stare at the small ceramic pig and stroke it absentmindedly. She cursed herself for the feelings it stirred within her.

_Maybe Booth's right. I mean, I can't imagine my life without him anymore, he's always there for me and I really do want to share everything with him. Maybe there really is more to love than genetics and chemical reactions. Maybe I love Booth…_

Taken aback at the realisation, Brennan gently laid Jasper back on her desk and attempted to read the file in front of her, unaware Booth was watching her from the corridor. He stepped forward, fully intending to walk back in there and tell her that she was the smartest idiot he knew, that love was the most important thing in the world.

_How can she not see how I feel about her? How can she not understand that? How can she not know how much I love her?_

Swallowing back all the words he couldn't find the strength to say, he resigned himself to the fact that Bones was never going to look at him the way he looked at her. She didn't love him.

Feeling his heart sink, Booth just sighed and walked away, unaware that the woman he loved was watching him go and praying she'd one day have the strength to follow.


End file.
